Ringing phones don't lead to any conclusion about missing jet

March 12, 2014 20:23 IST

Hopes of anguished relatives of 239 people on board the missing Malaysian plane were dashed after a tech expert dismissed the Theory of the Phantom calls, saying ringing phones does not lead to any conclusion.

With a massive multinational search operations failing to yield any result about the missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370, relatives of passengers resorted to calling their phones, and were greeted with ring tones.

Videos of the ringing phones have gone viral on social media, in turn leading to speculation that the jetliner is still safe.

But the hopes of the relatives of passengers aboard the Beijing-bound Boeing 777-200 plane were dashed after a tech expert dismissed the Theory of the Phantom calls, saying ringing phones does not lead to any conclusion.

"When a cell phone rings, it first connects with the network and attempts to locate the end-user's phone, if it doesn't find the phone after a few minutes, after a few rings, then typically, it disconnects and that's what's happening.

"So, they're hearing ringing and they're assuming it's connecting to their loved ones, but it's not. It's the network sending a signal to the phone letting them know it's looking for them," he said.

Kagan said the technology meant he couldn't speculate on what ringing phones in this situation could mean.

"Just because you're getting ringing, just because the signs that we see on these cell phones, that's no proof that there's any - that's just the way the networks work," he said.

The plane with 227 passengers, including five Indians and one Indian-origin Canadian, and 12 crew members mysteriously vanished over the South China Sea on Friday one hour after taking off from Kuala Lumpur.

The search for the plane today entered the fifth day, as 34 planes, 40 ships and teams from ten countries are scouring the waters on the plane's flight path and beyond to find it.